Tips and Tricks - 3 - Setup w/ Google Education Apps

I have put a lot of time into thinking about how we are organizing our iPod Touch initiative to enhance other educational initiatives in our district.  For example, we have implemented "Google Education Apps" for our 3rd through 8th grade students. These accounts are very beneficial in many ways.

1.  Each of our iPod Touches has a default Google Education Email associated with the device.  This allows us to report out app results, send and collect screenshots, and do other interesting activities with these devices.  Check out Tony Vincent's work as he has a great strategy for email and these devices on his website Learning in Hand.  Change the name field for each email to reflect the name and number of the iPod Touch device. 

2.  Our Google Education Email is set up with a filter system and we only allow the email to go to our student and teacher's domains.  This allows for a layer of security for this reporting process with emails.  Students can access their Google Documents easily.  Hopefully, we will see Apple and Google playing more nicely so that we can edit those documents more effectively. Currently, I am under the impression that you can only edit the spreadsheets.  Even that editing is limited to pretty much data entry.  

3.  Furthermore, there are some apps that we are going to be able to more fully utilize because of this email installation and our overall use of Google Education Apps.  gFlashPro (Direct Itunes Link) is a very good example.  We can input data into apps like this from our student accounts.  Jeremy Brueck did a nice review of gFlashPro for IEAR.org already.  Check it out here.

While flash cards are not the end all be all of education, and some would argue they are a waste of time, I do think there is a lot of value with technology initiatives that enhance other initiatives.  Students can create their own flash cards with their Google accounts.  Teachers could create a review list and share them out for all the students.  There are lots of possibilities here.  

The limit on using these types of apps is often the creativity in which you see some possibilities.  I could see students using this app as tool for presenting and or speech making with their notes visible. Additionally, these flash cards could be talking points in a discussion that the teachers would like the students to go through in some sequence.  The flash cards could represent the steps in a math equation or the steps in a science experiment.  There are numerous creative ways to use this application beyond rote memorization activities. Delivering key information to the students via gFlash, Google Education Apps, and an inexpensive mobile learning device can make a large impact in a classroom in a very subtle fashion.  

The steps for creating a gFlash card link with Google is easy.  1.  Create a Google Spreadsheet like the following example:  http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=tpn91z4DFFJxpkkSUSKU6wA&output=html.

Make sure you only use 2 columns of information. The first column will be the top of the column and the second column is the bottom or back.  Open gFlash, in the main menu, there is an option for "Get my Google Data".  Enter your log in information and your spreadsheets will show.  Choose your flash card spreadsheet from the list. One key feature to use for security sake, "choose clear my Google Login" after adding it to the library!

I look forward to finding more apps out there that can be mashed-up with our other initiatives.  Any and all comments are greatly appreciated!

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Comments

[Anne Dotson]

Looking for help in developing a new app for teaching character. Would like to develop one for Touch/Phone/Ipad